11 Feb 2019

There is need to exercise fiscal discipline and prudent financial management to sustain budget deficit, Ghanzi District Council finance committee chairperson, Mr Thato Tshweneyagae has said.

Mr Tshweneyagae made the appeal after presenting a 2019/2020 recurrent budget to the council meeting recently.

He acknowledged that government continued to run in a deficit as reflected in this year's budget speech. 

“Owing to this, our budget stands at P2.5 billion with a decrease of P3.6 million, which is a negative two per cent.

Mr Tshweneyagae, who noted that budget ceilings compelled them to cut their proposed budget to suit the tentative Revenue Support Grant (RSG) allocated to them, stated that their RSG stood at P199 193 260, which was less by P70 896 370 from their initial request.

He said bulk of the budget had been allocated to personnel emoluments, which is P109 million (53 per cent) with 47 per cent  for the running of the council.

“The increase in personnel emoluments is caused by the additional staff transferred from tribal administration as assistant community development officers and the councillors’ terminal benefits and executives’ gratuities that comes once after five years,” he explained.

Contributing on the budget overview, Councillor Onalethata Ngati of Bosele ward said budget cut called for prioritisation and establishment of revenue generating avenues.

Councillor for Kalkfontein, Mr Alec Motlhophele, said the council should do open tendering, to improve its revenue adding that a comprehensive financial plan was necessary.

Councillor Gregory Losibe challenged the council to think outside the box and come up with revenue generating initiatives citing streetlights advertising and utilisation of open spaces.

Mr Losibe also said the council should take advantage of ICT such as installation of computers in the council chamber to turn it to paperless council, saying it would make savings. ENDS